


Love Letters: Snippets

by StarsAndUniverses



Series: Love Letters Universe [2]
Category: The Transformers (Cartoon Generation One), Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers Generation One
Genre: M/M, Slice of Life
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-17
Updated: 2019-09-18
Packaged: 2020-01-15 06:11:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,256
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18493006
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StarsAndUniverses/pseuds/StarsAndUniverses
Summary: Miscellaneous scenes during or relating to the story "Love Letters"





	1. Mornings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Waking up too early helps nobody.

“Starscream, you’ve gotta wake up!” 

“What if I don’t want to? Ever think of that?” 

“Yes, I did, but I’ve also thought about how badly you’ll feel if you miss this class. So, up!” 

“I don’t even like this class! The professor’s an afthead! Frag him!” 

“Come on, Starry! You said you liked the professor!”

“That was last orn!”

“That was last  _ cycle _ !” 

“Well, then, I don’t like him anymore! He made his class too early!”

“You know he doesn’t control that.”

“Well, then he  _ should _ !” 

“Star, you need to go. He’ll get mad if you’re late.”

“Why should I get up if you’re not getting up?”

“Because I don’t have a morning lecture today.” 

“That’s not fair!” 

“I know that! I  _ wanted _ all my lectures to be morning lectures!” 

“You’ve got bolts loose! Why would you want that?”

“I work better in the mornings! I nearly pass out during the night lectures!”

“Because you wake up too early!”

“You should really get going!”

“Come with me!”

“Wha- I don’t even take that class! Math isn’t my thing!”

“I can’t believe you’d rather learn about organic life than about numbers. Numbers are more applicable in the  _ real _ world!” 

“So I’ve been told by, I dunno, literally everyone ever!”

“Where are you even going to  _ find _ that… plint, plont stuff?”

“It’s  _ plant _ , Star. They’re called  _ plants- _ ”

“Same difference!”

“You’re seriously gonna be late for your class!”

“Whatever, I can fly there!”

“No flying on campus, remember?”

“What?! That’s ridiculous!” 

“Oh, yeah,  _ now _ you’re rushing!”

“I may have forgotten that tiny detail!”

“Your prof’s gonna be so mad.”

“Shut up, Sky! I don’t need your inpu- WHERE IS MY TEXTBOOK?!”

“You mean this one?”

“Give it! This conversation isn’t over!”

“Better hurry~!” 

“Shut u-”

Starscream slammed the door before he could finish the sentence. Skyfire stared at the ceiling. He burst into laughter.

“What would I do without him?” 

He smiled to himself as he turned off the lights again and went back to sleep. 


	2. Bedtime Stories

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Everybody loves a good bedtime story.

He was an adult. At least, as close as he could get without anyone suspecting anything. 

A lot of things were on his side, all things considered. His voice was a bit raspy and unusually deep for a mech his age, which gave the impression that he was much older than he really was. He was a medic, and had that trademark medic strength that most mechs would have to train for vorns to get. He was only a bit short of a prodigy, so his knowledge of his profession surpassed that of most medics much older than him. 

But when it came right down to it, Ratchet wasn’t an adult. Sunstreaker and Sideswipe were perfect examples of what a mech his age  _ should _ act like. Impulsive and garish, loud and obnoxious, drowning in his own hubris. 

And yet, seeing mechs, some of them your friends, die in your hands sobered a mech up to the real world real quick. 

He had a tally, sometimes in the back of his mind, sometimes scrawled into the back of his hand with whatever scalpel he could reach, of how many mechs he’d lost to the Allspark. That number, growing, albeit slowly over the vorns, haunted his recharge, keeping him up at hours that Primus himself would not authorize.

Tonight was one of those nights. A night where he could twist and turn and not get any slagging sympathy for it from his own processor. Everything was suddenly too much, too loud, too bright, too  _ pointless _ , that he couldn’t even think.

So he left his room and started the long trek over to the medbay in the pitch black hallways. 

He didn’t need to turn on his headlights or the brightness of his optics. He knew the path to the medbay perfectly well, and he stumbled along with one hand on the wall to guide him. His footsteps echoed loudly, the only sound besides the faint rumbling of engines through habsuite doors. 

It wasn’t even fifteen minutes until he reached the medbay and he’d been walking purposefully slow. It was halfway through First Aid’s shift and the little visored mech would probably try to kick him right back out the way he came, but he wouldn’t have it. 

Surprisingly, when he opened the door, there wasn’t an indignant cry or a hand shoving him right back out the door. The lights were on, but it was dead silent. Tools seemed in the process of making it back into their places after the last patients, but they were only halfway there. 

Curled up on a medical slab was First Aid, visor dim, fully in recharge. Ratchet couldn’t help but let his EM field waver in an unusual flounder of parental pride. It didn’t matter that Aidie was older than him, by a larger amount than Ratchet felt comfortable, but his demeanor was the perfect balance between wise and childish, and he looked up to Ratchet so much as a mentor.

If only he knew. 

Ratchet walked up to the berth, gently tapping on First Aid’s shoulder.

“W-what? Who? Do you require medical assistance...es?” Aid slurred out, clearly not fully or even barely half awake. 

Ratchet chuckles and whispered gently. “It’s shift change. You need to go recharge.” 

First Aid mumbled something unintelligible, something halfway between sorry and thank you and dragged himself to his peded, stumbling out of the medbay like a zombie. Ratchet would bet good money First Aid wouldn’t notice his shift wasn’t even half done until he woke up midday tomorrow.

In the newly abandoned medbay, Ratchet let his mind turn to mush in the drol tasks around his domain, putting away tools and disinfecting everything in sight while all the troublemakers on base weren’t around to muck it all up again. He didn’t check the clock, knowing that he’d be tired the next day regardless, and managed to get halfway across the medbay before the doors opened again. 

Not turning to look at who was there, he called over his shoulder, “Yes, Aidie, I’m aware that it wasn’t polite, but you were passed out on a medberth and I couldn’t possibly have let you finish the rest of your shift in good conscious.” 

A deep chuckle rang through the medbay, with an equally deep voice mocking him. “You call First Aid… Aidie?” 

“Optimus?!” Ratchet whirled around, his rouge elbow knocking over the row of tools he’d just cleaned. 

Optimus walked in, shuffling so lightly that anyone else but Ratchet wouldn’t have been able to tell. “Yes. I passed by your room to make sure you were there. I figured I’d find you here.” 

A scoff escaped him before he could stop it. “And why would you think I need to be checked in on like some sparkling?”

A noise like a loud purr left Optimus, a testament to how tired he was too if he couldn’t control his reactions like that. “I couldn’t sleep either. Figured you’d be nice to talk to.”

Ratchet tentatively put down the sponge he was holding and eyed Optimus top to bottom. The Prime was leaning to the left a bit, probably keeping his weight off of his bad leg - that no one but Ratchet, of course, even knew he  _ had _ . His optics were lazily dimmed, half as bright as they were when he walked through the halls of the Ark, boosting crew moral. His head finials were tilted back slightly, Optimus not caring enough at the moment to hold them up high. 

“You look tired to me.” 

A shrug was the only response he got. Ratchet rolled his eyes. “So what did you want to talk about, Optimus?” 

Optimus tossed himself onto a medical berth and scooted his legs to the side, patting the free space for Ratchet to sit down. “Can I tell you a story about my time back on Cybertron?” 

Ratchet couldn’t stop the shock that flooded his EM field. Optimus had never been one to reminisce about the past. 

“What’s the occasion?” Ratchet raised an eyebrow.

“Oh, nothing. I was simply hoping I could bore the two of us to sleep.”

Ratchet snorted hard, flicking around to look at Optimus in his clearly amused faceplates. 

“What could you possibly mean? You are arguably the most interesting Cybertronian left alive!” 

Optimus let out another tired purr and shook his head. “I’m sure Soundwave has more incredible stories about the Decepticons than I do of my Autobots.” 

“Why Soundwave?”

Optimus got a mischievous glint in his eye and looked right at Ratchet. “Ratchet, you know Megatron is too incompetent to even know he’s leading a faction.” 

If Ratchet had been drinking energon, he would’ve spit it right back out. His laughter echoed in the empty medbay, and he was certain the mechs in the nearest rooms could hear it too. 

“I’d think you were overcharged the way you’re speaking now, Optimus!” 

“No, I am simply tired. Now, may I tell you that story?” 

Ratchet let Optimus talk about whatever he was talking about - Optimus’s thoughts sounded unusually unconnected and tangential, as if he was just talking for the sake of filling the silence rather than trying to get a point across. 

With Optimus’s rumbling voice in the background, Ratchet found himself drifting off, slowly sinking down next to Optimus on the medberth they were sharing, processor vehemently urging him to go into recharge. Optimus patted his head with a heavy hand, much like a creator would do to their sparkling. In fact, this whole thing seemed as if Optimus was telling him a…

A bedtime story. 

Ratchet tried to jerk his half sleeping processor awake, but with little success. He looked up at Optimus, who was now sitting up and had moved Ratchet’s head into his lap to keep petting as talked on. 

“You know, don’t you?” Ratchet’s vocalizer was full of static, not fully online, as most of the rest of him was. 

Optimus merely chuckled and nodded. “Yes, I do. I’ve known for a while now.” 

Being immensely tired did not lend well to pondering the internal machinations of Primus’s chosen one. “But… why do you… let me fight?” 

Optimus shrugged, too noncommittally for Ratchet’s taste, “I let Bumblebee fight. You two are both very capable young mecha. It would be an insult to bar your from doing your jobs simply based on your age. You both have the skill.” 

Ratchet felt tears welling up in his optics and he was too tired to keep them from flowing down his face. “D-does anyone else know?”

A simple shake of the head dispelled many of Ratchet’s fears. “I am aware you do not want anyone else to know. It’s your secret to tell, not mine.” 

His body finally gave out as his vision started darkening, Optimus’s face peacefully fading away as he kept telling him stories about what Cybertron used to be like. He floated off into a deep, peaceful recharge, void of nightmares and horrifying memories. 

And for the first time in a long, long while, Ratchet didn’t resent being so young. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For all those people who loved Young Ratchet!


	3. Diplomatic Partisanship

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Primus was merciful. Primus was kind. Primus was all caring, all loving.   
> So why the frag couldn’t he be that way with Soundwave?

Primus was merciful. Primus was kind. Primus was all caring, all loving. 

So why the  _ frag _ couldn’t he be that way with Soundwave? 

He tried to not stomp through the halls of the Ark but he couldn’t stop himself. The clang of his feet on the metal floors was satisfying, borderline cathartic. Rumble and Frenzy were with Bumblebee, the little annoying yellow bot that everyone loved  _ so _ much. Soundwave didn’t know why it bothered him but he didn’t care. It just  _ did _ . 

Ratbat and Laserbeak had gone and made friends with Prowl and Bluestreak, of all mechs, finding their doorwings a wonderful place to perch. For some reason, the Praxians allowed their doors to be used as roosts. 

Ravage, who he had thought would absolutely loathe anything to do with the Autobots, started hanging out with  **_Blaster_ ** . How could he? How fragging could he? Soundwave wasn’t going near him with a 20 meter pole, truce or no truce! 

And so, Soundwave was left alone, stomping to the bridge for his stupid meeting with the stupid Prime about their stupid truce because he was the fragging stupid representative for the stupid Decepticons. 

Soundwave looked at the door to the bridge in front of him. 

This was so  _ stupid _ . 

Soundwave had the full intention to punch the door, rather than knock, but as he reeled his fist back and let it snap hard into the metal, but instead of metal, there was the sharp crack of glass. Soundwave looked up and realized with dread that the door had been opened for him. By the Prime. His fist was not in the door. It was in the Prime. Glass was on the floor and a shocked High Command of both Autobots and Decepticons were sat behind Optimus, staring in horror.

Soundwave had fragging punched the Prime’s windshield in. And the Prime didn’t even have the decency to seem fussed. 

How  _ dare _ he? 

The Prime smiled. “Hello, Soundwave. It’s a pleasure to have you join us.”

“Prime’s windshield: Is not pleased.” 

Jazz scoffed from the table and the Prime let out a loud, warm chuckle. 

Soundwave felt the extremely strong compulsion to punch out the other half of Optimus’s windshield instead of worrying about the strange flip his spark did when Optimus’s optics gave him a fond look. He was too busy blushing behind his facemask to notice being dragged into the room and sat next to Optimus himself. 

Feelings could be so stupid.


End file.
